Fiction writer, poet, and playwright J. J. Steinfeld lives on Prince Edward Island, where he is patiently waiting for Godot’s arrival and a phone call from Kafka. While waiting, he has published sixteen books, including Our Hero in the Cradle of Confederation (Novel, Pottersfield Press), Disturbing Identities (Stories, Ekstasis Editions), Should the Word Hell Be Capitalized? (Stories, Gaspereau Press), Anton Chekhov Was Never in Charlottetown (Stories, Gaspereau Press), Would You Hide Me? (Stories, Gaspereau Press), An Affection for Precipices (Poetry, Serengeti Press), Misshapenness (Poetry, Ekstasis Editions), Identity Dreams and Memory Sounds (Poetry, Ekstasis Editions), and Madhouses in Heaven, Castles in Hell (Stories, Ekstasis Editions). His short stories and poems have appeared in numerous periodicals and anthologies internationally, and over forty of his one-act plays and a handful of full-length plays have been performed in Canada and the United States.

              Time Travel and Praying


Tiring of time travel
despairing of praying
on a day with little wisdom
yet clouds as perfectly shaped
as ancient guilt and future regret
a nondescript theologian ponders
the perplexing differences between
deterministic and nondeterminstic 
existence and nonexistence
sense and nonsense
when a sudden vision of an airbrushed  Hell 
disrupts the pondering
then the nondescript theologian 
rushes to an intersection
strangled with tourists and shoppers
crazed supplicants and childish devotees
the now disrupted nondescript theologian
does an awkward yet elaborate dance
in front of the gathered crowd
no applause, little questioning
goes home crestfallen and stares into
a mirror, repeatedly replaced
broken too many times to count
seven years times seven years
times seven years or more bad luck
and resumes both time travel
and praying simultaneously.



 Pretend You Are Not Pretending


a slight noise, a quiver of light,
you are stopped in the street
nothing remarkable
nothing sinister you can readily define
their uniforms are without insignias 
or adornment whatsoever
simply freshly laundered uniforms
the colour of old photographs
yet you are frightened
for a response is required
a measurement of your life’s worth
details from the last year or two
of sleight of hand and artifice
you fear the evaluation  
but silence is an even deeper denial

to last another night
to be allowed to walk away
as if nothing had happened
as if there is no distant or near past
as if words can escort you to safety
you concoct a life with some substance
hope your breaths shimmer something memorable
argue your scream has import
rationalize your departure as for the best
pretend you are not pretending




          I Intend to Dream Another Captivity


The two interrogators jostled for position
like two old-time comics trying to save their careers
all over who would in what order
ask me questions that were
more circuitous than a perfect maze
more convoluted than an imperfect prayer.

First the one then the second
screeched, You-better-answer-or-else
you’ll never see your loved ones again,
their threats copycat clichés.

The old-time comics become shoddy B-movie actors
mangling their lines, getting the accents wrong
like winter weather in the middle of summer:
Why are you here?
Where are your papers?
Who sent you?

I stopped listening
be they comedians or inept actors
I had other images to contemplate
another life to invent
besides, I intend to dream
another captivity
this one is more tedious
than even the last.

Louis-Daniel Boulanger is a husband, father, professional procrastinator and extremely part-time scribe living just outside Toronto, Canada. Considering Haiku's little word puzzles he spends some insignificant time crafting his own short and sweet confections. 

                    Haiku Scribblings

Ed: A collection of (mostly) absurd little haiku’s.  Not to be taken seriously.

no sight of nature
resignation settles deep
tradition no more

A form-free Haiku 
Both lovely and most absurd
A neat little gift

Nose thumbing at con-vention is a most grati-fying rebellion

Writing haiku's with
five/seven syllable words
trite, mad and sublime

Vocabulary
Oversimplification
Irrefutable

Stunning madness; the
poems hold little meaning-
bring joy nonetheless

Louis-Daniel Boulanger is a husband, father, professional procrastinator and extremely part-time scribe living just outside Toronto, Canada.

​A haiku for you
They don't always make sense though 
Defenestration

Fiction writer, poet, and playwright J. J. Steinfeld lives on Prince Edward Island, where he is patiently waiting for Godot’s arrival and a phone call from Kafka. While waiting, he has published sixteen books, including Our Hero in the Cradle of Confederation (Novel, Pottersfield Press), Disturbing Identities (Stories, Ekstasis Editions), Should the Word Hell Be Capitalized? (Stories, Gaspereau Press), Anton Chekhov Was Never in Charlottetown (Stories, Gaspereau Press), Would You Hide Me? (Stories, Gaspereau Press), An Affection for Precipices (Poetry, Serengeti Press), Misshapenness (Poetry, Ekstasis Editions), Identity Dreams and Memory Sounds (Poetry, Ekstasis Editions), and Madhouses in Heaven, Castles in Hell (Stories, Ekstasis Editions). His short stories and poems have appeared in numerous periodicals and anthologies internationally, and over forty of his one-act plays and a handful of full-length plays have been performed in Canada and the United States.

THE STORYTELLER’S EDUCATION by J. J. Steinfeld
​
learning love songs
from a cynic of love

learning immortality
from a forgotten ancestor

learning perfect one-liners
from a tongueless mime

learning time-telling
from a timeless beauty

learning disbelief
from a steadfast believer

learning high-jumping
from a legless dreamer

learning dreaming
from the sleepless coward

learning to count the days
from the fingerless conjurer

learning unscathed escape
from the spider-webbed insect

learning disappearing
from the magician’s sad rabbit

WHAT IS YOUR CONCLUSION?  by J. J. Steinfeld

A man who looks like a woman
perhaps a woman who looks like a man
difficult to tell from this distance
this distorting time of the evening
the light practising deception
this mysterious man or woman
raises both arms toward the sky
and starts to pray in a voice
that sounds neither male nor female
a storm is starting and the sound
is being competed with by self-centred winds
that can upstage the firmest performer.
I listen, attempt to collect words
from the air but the winds
do not relent, envious of those
who pray during storms,
and I am left standing
in confusion and displacement.
Tomorrow, the forecast is less
treacherous, and I will move closer
to those defying the winds.